Reunited
by lermanade
Summary: After the Malloys' Ohio home is burnt to ashes, they need a place to stay. And guess who's offering their services? The Hatfords are welcoming the Malloys into their house in Buckman for a year, six years after the Malloys moved away. One house. One year. Two families. This reunion is sure to be epic, and Beth and Josh may find love in the middle of it all.
1. Flames

**Author's Note: Hey! This is my first story on here so please R&R and show me some love! I loved the Boy/Girl Battle series as a kid, so here I am chronicling the adventures of teenage Hatfords and Malloys.**

**This is mainly a Josh/Beth focused fic, but some other things might pop up throughout. I hope this plot is a bit more original than the usual, "The Malloys are moving back!" type fic. (Not that I don't love those.)**

**The whole story** **is in Beth's POV. Beth is seventeen (junior), Eddie eighteen (senior), and Caroline fifteen (sophomore: she's precocious). Also, I know this chapter is Hatfordless, but it's needed to get the plot moving. On with the story!**

* * *

1: Flames

Birds were singing, leaves were dancing in the autumn wind, and everything on our quaint little street seemed completely mundane that morning.

Except, you know, our house was on fire.

I took in the whole scene with quiet, disbelieving horror, hands shoved into my sweatshirt pockets as I stood on the sidewalk. Smoke curled up in spirals, marring the perfect blue. My jaw was dropped in surprise, eyes widened. I knew my expression would be comical in any other situation. I risked a glance over at my older sister Eddie who, apart from one blond eyebrow raised to her hairline, was unreadable. And then there was Caroline.

Oh, Caroline.

My younger sister had always been a drama queen, but this was pushing the boundaries a bit. She was wailing. Actually _wailing_ at a pitch that was so high it shouldn't be legal. Her chocolate curls flew behind her in the wind as she suddenly pitched herself into my arms, crying on my shoulder and moaning about her great loss.

...And now I have snot on my shirt. Great.

While I was concerned for my sisters, I was also a bit miffed at the situation. Were Eddie and Caroline's stuff reduced to a pile of ashes?_ Nooo_, of course not. All of their stuff was unharmed in suitcases, sitting on the backseat of the car behind us. They, along with our parents, had just gotten back from a month at our grandparents' house in Florida, while I had been away at a summer college program at Ohio State. And joy of joys, I had come back a day earlier than everyone else which gave me time to unpack all my stuff this morning before driving to the airport and picking everyone up.

All I had now was the clothes on my back and a seriously pissed-off attitude.

"Shut up, Caroline," I snapped, pushing my fourteen-year-old bratty sister off. "At least you still have most of your stuff."

Caroline sniffed. Eddie didn't move. I stared helplessly at our home once again.

All of a sudden, I felt sick. My stomach flipped over, and I choked on the words I was about to fling at my sister to get her to shut up. I just watched the fire in a sort of daze, as everything dipped and turned around me. I sank to the ground shakily, hugging my knees to my chest. The orange flames tumbled and twisted in the breeze. The colors flickered from orange to red to hot white-blue. The white shutters were slowly crumbling to a black burning mess, and instead of leaves fluttering by, it was ash.

I felt a sharp pain in my arm, and looked up to see Eddie poking me to break me out of my reverie. She gave me a look like, "Dude, now is _so_ not the time for a mental breakdown." I shook my head to clear my thoughts, but it was to no avail.

A whining siren rounded the corner, and a fire truck screeched to a halt in front of the house, spraying gravel everywhere. We watched as the firemen worked, still rooted into place on the sidewalk. My parents were standing a little ways away, my mother sobbing into my father's shirt.

I still felt unwell. Time and movement became a hazy blur as voices shouted and people brushed past me, and suddenly I was gasping for breath and was that Caroline crying? All I could hear were my own breaths, dictated in my mind. In. Out. In. Out. There you go. In out in out inoutinoutinout. No, slower. In. Out.

There was only smoke, rising up, up, and away, hiding the brilliant blue of the sky.

* * *

I listened to the variety of sounds filling the room. Dishes clanked together, adding to the general din. People laughed and talked and ate, all loudly and happily without a care. Nobody noticed the family huddled together in the corner booth. Nobody realized we were homeless.

We were _homeless_. I sucked in a sharp breath.

I stabbed my rubbery eggs with a fork and shoved them into my mouth. They tasted okay, but I hardly noticed.

"Beth?" I looked up. My family and I were eating dinner at some tiny diner down the street from where we (used to) lived, their concerned gazes resting on me. I fidgeted uncomfortably.

"Beth, were you listening?" Dad asked. "I just said we have some news."

"You found a house?" Eddie asked. Her chocolate irises filled with hope. It was childish hope, though. It hadn't even been two hours since the fire. But there was a secret part of me that hoped we had found one too.

"Well... kind of," he replied. I raised an eyebrow at this. I hated the elusive "kind of." A question required a yes or no answer, and anything in between was evading the real thing, usually meaning they meant the answer you didn't want to hear. I was very well acquainted with "kind of."

"You wanna explain? Because that doesn't make any sense," I snarled. Well. Wasn't I just Miss America today?

"We found a temporary place to stay," Mom explained. See, Mom understands the inadequacy of a "kind of." After all, she did give birth to me seventeen years ago. God bless that woman, really.

I asked the golden question that I knew my sisters had on the tips of their tongues. "Where?"

Mom and Dad exchanged a Glance. Not just a Glance, but an Uneasy Glance. This was bad. This was very bad. Eddie and I shared an Uneasy Glance of our own. God, what if we had to stay with our crazy Uncle Jimmy? The guy was totally insane. He talks to imaginary people and always smells faintly of wet dog. I could _not_ handle that kind of living.

"Well, you guys remember Buckman, right?"

Oh. Buckman. It was a little town in West Virginia where we had rented a house six years ago. Our neighbors turned out to be the Hatfords, a family of four boys who enjoyed sports, baked goods, and filling rivers with dead animals (_looooong_ story). After twelve months of a feud, pranks, cookies, and even a short-lived romance between Josh Hatford and me, we had moved back to Ohio with a grudging acceptance for the boys, though some things were left rocky. I smiled despite myself at the memories.

"Buckman? But there's no hotels in Buckman," Eddie pointed out, confused. I tilted my head. She was right.

Another Uneasy Glance was exchanged. Dear Lord.

"We won't be in a hotel."

Wait for it…

"The Hatfords have invited us to stay with them for a while."

Speak of the devil. This wasn't bad. No, it was worse. This was utterly catastrophic.


	2. Nervous

**A/N: Hey! Super sorry for the long wait… you have to upload all chapters on a computer and since my parents don't know I write fan fiction, I had some trouble sneaking on here to write. But here it is, chapter 2!**

**Special thanks to the 4 lovely people who reviewed the first chapter! Please, please, please drop me a review, as I would love to know what you all think of this story so far. :)**

**Finally, the Hatfords are here! Jake and Josh are eighteen (seniors), Wally is sixteen (sophomore), and little Peter is fourteen (eighth grader). **

**Also, there is some swearing down at the end, and there will be some throughout the story (I mean, come on. Hatfords vs. Malloys as teenagers? It was bound to happen.), so if you're not okay with that, I apologize. This was rated T for a reason. Here we go!**

* * *

2: Nervous

I was not ready to meet the Hatfords.

Well, _remeet_ them. But still.

Our drive from Ohio to Buckman took many hours, which was plenty of time for me to imagine every possible scenario that could result from us staying in their home.

Most of them ended with murder. Usually on Eddie's part against Jake.

But there were a few that worried me, like a particularly steamy one involving Josh and me that I didn't let cross my mind again, for fear of my red cheeks giving me away. I was most nervous about seeing Josh again; after all, God only knows what my ex-boyfriend would be up to these days. Jake and Josh had been quite popular in their grade, much to the chagrin of my older sister, and I had no doubt he could easily get himself a girlfriend. What if he had a girlfriend? Awkward. So awkward. I told myself that our relationship happened when we were eleven for god's sake and I had no reason to feel so possessive of the boy. It didn't quell my worries.

I was apparently the only worried one out of us five Malloys, however. Eddie was the poster child of teenage indifference with one arm slung carelessly over her closed eyes, headphones blocking out all other noise. I honestly didn't know if she found the prospect of reuniting with her childhood enemies unpleasant, or if she was above such petty matters. There was no way to tell.

Caroline, on the other hand, was a freaking ball of sunshine. She chattered on about anything and everything, topics ranging from, "Does Wally remember me? Did Wally miss me? Oh, I bet he thought of me _all the time_!" to, "What new house are we gonna buy? Can we buy a mansion? I really want a mansion. _Really._"

Neither of my parents bothered to dignify her with a response, something I couldn't blame them for.

I fidgeted. I listened to music. I watched the hills roll past. I fidgeted some more. I thought. I worried. There are absolutely no distractions during such a long road trip, and I seriously could have used one right about then.

There was also the issue of my clothes.

See, right before we left, my trusty best friend had offered me another outfit to wear since all my things got destroyed in the fire and there was no time to go shopping. I had gratefully thanked her for them, but… they were revealing. Very, very revealing.

I was currently wearing an adorable, flowy white tank top. Yeah, adorable until you realized it only covered my chest and _just_ reached my belly button. My shorts were tight, cut off at not even an inch beneath my butt, and only a little high-waisted, revealing an entire strip of my tummy.

Joy.

It _was_ very cute, though. I got a bit suspicious when my friend insisted on also curling my hair and doing my makeup, but I had a feeling she knew I was nervous about Josh. And you know what they say, a new look means a new you.

But the old me was still very much here, and totally freaking out. And as the distance between us and Buckman slowly diminished, I found my stomach doing backflips. It was time.

* * *

The car shuddered to a stop right in front of Casa Hatford. The minivan's doors rolled open, and my two sisters clambered out while complaining about their cramped muscles from sitting down so long. I shakily exited as well, eyeing the house warily. It was mid-afternoon two days after the fire that had taken almost everything from me, and the sky looked absolutely beautiful. Nobody would be able to tell that the apocalypse would occur today.

...

Okay, so _maybe_ I was being a tad melodramatic, but could you blame me? Think about it! It was six years after leaving our enemies, and now we would be _living_ with them.

Oh God, I hope we don't set _their_ house on fire, too.

I was scared out of my thoughts when I looked up at the house again. Peeking out of the attic window was a face. It was a very familiar face, and it stared straight at me with a wide-eyed expression. I stumbled back in shock, almost bumping into the car before gaining my balance. The face disappeared, replaced by blue curtains.

Well. That was creepy.

While I contemplated the impending doom of the situation, as well as the boy in the attic, Caroline wasted no time in marching up to the front door and pounding on the doorbell like her life depended on it. She poked it repeatedly until Eddie (thankfully) hit her over the head. I lugged myself up the stairs and told my sisters to grab their luggage, bitterness creeping into my tone.

I didn't have any luggage.

Finally, the door swung open, right as my sisters left me alone on the doorstep. I was not prepared to see the tall, lean boy that stood in front of me, one hand on the doorframe, the other shoved into the disheveled mess of dirty blond hair that sat atop his head. Judging from his widened soft brown eyes, and parted lips (they looked _so _kissable; I needed to get a handle on my raging hormones), he was surprised to see me too.

It was my enemy, my ex-boyfriend, the face in the attic window. It was Josh Hatford, and he looked hot as hell.

* * *

It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop.

The seven of us Hatford and Malloy kids were sitting in the Hatford living room, in the chairs, couches, and spread out across the floor. Seven pairs of eyes wandered over each other, but nobody spoke.

Peter, God bless him, was the first to crack.

"It's too quiet in here!" He whined, shattering the silence. At fourteen, he had grown up a lot since the last time I saw him. He was taller, and more muscular, and had a mouthful of braces and some scattered acne across his forehead. But I knew, both from his last remark and the same wonder that filled his eyes, he was the same old Peter.

"I would have baked you cookies, Peter, but I had nowhere to do it," I said, a sad smile flitting across my face. Eddie squeezed my hand in a rare gesture of affection. The two of us had our differences, but we were still sisters.

The four boys looked startled that I had spoken at all. I inwardly rolled my eyes at this. Apparently reading books and being a mute, antisocial loser were synonymous to these boys. How stereotypical.

Peter smirked. "Now you can bake them for me every single day." I snorted. Yeah, right.

Caroline was the next to crack.

"Wally," she announced loudly, drawing all attention to her, which I knew was her motive. There was a pause as poor Wally looked at her, slightly terrified. "Did ya miss me?"

"Um…" He looked to his older brothers for assistance, both of whom expertly avoided his gaze. Wally had always been awkward and bumbling, especially when it came to Caroline. He shoved his mop of brown hair out of his eyes and stuttered. "I-I… yes?"

He really couldn't win. If he said yes, we all knew Caroline would be a smug little bitch for the rest of the day. If he said no, there would be a repeat of the wailing episode from a few days ago. Poor kid.

"I knew it! I told you he missed me, Eddie." She sat back in her seat, satisfied.

"Whatever, Caroline," Eddie said. That seemed to be her go-to response when conversing with our younger sister. Scratch that. It was _everyone's_ go-to response when conversing with our younger sister.

"Alright, losers." Ah, and there was Jake, taking charge as Jake was wont to do. He and Josh looked almost identical, but Jake had a snapback shoved into his hair. "This shit is obviously awkward as hell, so let's do something before I shoot myself."

Jake apparently had no problem with swearing, and that was supposed to be some sign of masculinity to him. I scoffed. Boys.

Eddie looked like she was about use some… ahem, PG-13 words to express her annoyance with Jake already (I guessed some things never changed), but I decided to beat her to it. After all, he would just write Eddie off as a boy if she used his "masculine" expressions. I wanted to see what he would say about me.

"You're right, O Wise One. Sitting around like a bunch of antisocial freaks when we could be doing something you approve of, like, oh I don't know, _baseball_, just won't do, now will it? Let's go and fuck shit up like we used to, yeah?" My tone was casual bordering on sarcastic. I knew Caroline would probably blab about my potty mouth to Mom later, but as I looked around at four awestruck expressions, I smirked to myself.

Totally worth it.


End file.
